352 HOKSE POETRAITURE. 



PUPIL. When I "moved to the West," there was no 

 other kind grown, and it would have been thought folly 

 for a man to seed his ground to Timothy or clover, when 

 he could have thousands of tons of prairie hay for the 

 cutting. The whole country at that time, saving the small 

 proportion in cultivation, was covered with grass. The 

 rolling prairie had a fine growth, that would yield from 

 one to two tons to the acre. The small ravines and little 

 flats lying along the creeks had a thick growth, somewhat 

 like red-top, which would cut two to three tons. The large 

 bottoms bordering on the Mississippi and other rivers 

 were hid by a growth that looked like a diminutive 

 cane-brake, and would cut four tons and upwards to the 

 acre. The variety of large grass thought most highly of 

 is called blue-joint, and I have seen it grow so high as to 

 completely hide a man on horseback, when riding through it, 



A few miles north of my place is a bottom at the junc- 

 tion of the Maquoketa river with the Mississippi ; it is 

 some six or eight miles wide between the bluffs on the 

 latter named river, gradually narrowing as it recedes till, 

 some twelve or fifteen miles up, the bluffs come together 

 with just room for the smaller river to run through. These 

 bluffs are an appropriate framework, rising to a height 

 of three hundred feet, their sides nearly perpendicular and 

 rocky, but where their abruptness is not excessive a 

 heavy timber is growing. From the summit of the bluffs 

 one can see almost every acre of this luxuriant delta, and 

 in the month of July to look down on this waving "emerald 

 sea" of verdure is a beautiful sight. 



On this bottom I was favored once with the grandest 

 demonstration of the sublimity of a prairie on fire that I 

 ever witnessed. I had seen, hundreds of times, the ruddy 

 streams chasing each other over the rolling prairie, the 

 line extending for miles, flickering and flashing over 

 thousands of acres. This is always a pretty sight, calling 



